Twitpic Isn't Shutting Down Anymore, Says It's Been Acquired

According to Twitpic, the company isn't shutting down anymore. In fact, it's been acquired and will live on.

That's all according to a tweet – one that's admittedly sparse in terms of specifics. "We're happy to announce we've been acquired and Twitpic will live on! We will post more details as we can disclose the," says Twitpic. No mention of who the buyer is.

We're happy to announce we've been acquired and Twitpic will live on! We will post more details as we can disclose them

You may recall that Twitpic, one of the most-popular image hosting sites around, announced earlier this month that it would be shutting down on September 25th. The company blamed Twitter, claiming that the social network was threatening legal action over Twitpic's trademark application.

"We originally filed for our trademark in 2009 and our first use in commerce dates back to February 2008 when we launched. We encountered several hurdles and difficulties in getting our trademark approved even though our first use in commerce predated other applications, but we worked through each challenge and in fact had just recently finished the last one. During the “published for opposition” phase of the trademark is when Twitter reached out to our counsel and implied we could be denied access to their API if we did not give up our mark," said the company. "Unfortunately we do not have the resources to fend off a large company like Twitter to maintain our mark which we believe whole heartedly is rightfully ours. Therefore, we have decided to shut down Twitpic."

Twitpic was recently accused of preventing photo downloads, even though it promised users they would be able to grab all of their images before the shutdown.

Depending on who's acquiring Twitpic, it's possible that the war chest may soon have enough to fight that trademark battle after all.